


Family By Blood (On Your Shoes)

by aliencereal



Category: Saints Row
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Friendship, Gangs, Gen, Implied Pairings, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Kidnapping, Murder, Pancakes, Sharing Clothes, Team as Family, gendered slurs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-10
Updated: 2014-10-10
Packaged: 2018-02-20 15:46:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2434277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aliencereal/pseuds/aliencereal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After rescuing Shaundi from her ex-boyfriend, the teenaged Saints hide out in IHOP.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Family By Blood (On Your Shoes)

It's the first time Shaundi has ever been to IHOP sober.

Johnny is sitting next to her, on the outside of the booth so she's safely boxed in between him and the wall. The Boss is across from her, picking dried blood out from under her fingernails with her fork, and Pierce is next to Boss, frantically texting. His acne is worse than usual; actually, they all look like hell.

Shaundi's hands are shaking under the cuffs of Johnny's jacket. It's too big for her, the ends of sleeves swallowing up her chipped purple fingernails and the parts of her wrists that are rubbed raw. The smell of stale cigarette smoke and shitty hair gel is the best protection she has against the memory of zip ties and bruising hands.

It isn't cold in the stupid pancake house, but Shaundi sure as hell isn't giving Johnny his jacket back without being asked.

Everyone is silent for the first five minutes, with the exception of when they order their food. Shaundi doesn't have any money on her, but Boss orders her a shit-ton of pancakes anyways, nudging Shaundi's ankles with her toes under the table as she does so. Johnny and Boss have some kind of regular order, and Pierce orders french toast. On a regular day, Shaundi would probably have given him shit for that. Right now, she's too shaken to care.

“So... We gonna talk to the cops?” She asks finally, once the waitress is out of earshot. The Boss looks at her like she's lost her mind.

“Why the fuck would we talk to the cops? They'd put Johnny 'n me in jail, sweetheart,” Boss tells her, reaching for her hands across the table. Shaundi holds on tight to the offered lifeline, Boss' hands with only the fabric of Johnny's jacket between them.

“Aren't they looking for me?” Shaundi asks, looking between Boss and Johnny in confusion. “My parents...”

“Never reported you missing,” Johnny finishes for her. It hits harder than anything else has in the past three days, harder than Veteran Child's fists or the spray of his brains against the concrete of a dorm basement.

Boss still has the gun hidden under her clothes.

“I was gone for three fuckin' days!” Shaundi protests, near tears with anger and disbelief. “He took me from my fucking living room!”

For a moment, their table is silent. Eventually, though, Pierce looks up from his cell phone. Shaundi has no idea who he's been texting; probably whoever he borrowed their getaway car from.

“I don't mean to freak you out or anything, but, uh. If that motherfucker knew where you live, you might want to stay the fuck out of your house for a while,” Pierce tells her, and Boss looks sharply over at him.

“ _Fuck._ I was right, then? Gang connections?” She asks, and Pierce nods. Johnny snorts derisively.

“So what? Bring it on. We'll kill anyone the motherfuckers throw at us.”

Shaundi watches something light up in Boss' eyes as she watches Johnny's bravado. It's the same mix of affection and admiration that she sees between them on a regular basis; between that and the fact that Boss spends most of her nights crashing on Johnny's couch, it's really a mystery why the two of them don't just get married or some shit.

“Bet it's more pussies like Veteran Child?” Boss asks, smirking. Johnny grins back at her.

“Probably.”

Pierce makes a face like he just swallowed a lemon.

“Alright, before you guys start jacking off to the thought of murder, do we wanna figure out where Shaundi is staying?”

“Well, that's fuckin' obvious. She'll stay with me and the Boss,” Johnny replies, and the Boss gives a thumbs up.

Pierce sighs heavily.

“At your parents' house?” He asks, looking a bit put-upon.

“Hell yeah. Mom and Pop are too high most days to even notice the Boss sleepin' on our couch, I hardly think Shaundi'll be a problem,” Johnny puts an arm around Shaundi's shoulders as he says it, and she relaxes a bit. Her parents suck ass, but it looks like her friends are going to pick up the slack.

She's never had IHOP pancakes taste this good.


End file.
